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January 31, 2014

“Ghosts of DC” has provided a video for a mid-20th century television series put together by the Army Pictorial Service. I don’t remember it being on TV, but wiki gives information. The series was called “The Big Picture.” This segment is titled: “Alexandria: City of Understanding.” The city declared the week of June 9-15 as “Alexandria Salutes the Army.”

The year isn’t given so I queried The Washington Post. The event took place in 1957. A parade and dances were held, shoppers in Old Town found bargains and discounts, and city officials and civic leaders hosted Army personnel and vice versa at Fort Belvoir. The Post also published a photo of Patricia A. Rose, who was voted “Miss Alexandria.”

Anyway, this program is a treasure trove of moving pictures and images. I went through it and jotted down these thoughts and observations.

1:31 100 Block of Prince Street, apparently two-ways back then.

1:45 Ficklin Elementary School. Didn’t know about this one. Google says it was near 2nd and Pitt. Now townhomes.

2:07 Market Square/Old Farmers Market in a way I have not seen it before.

2:23 Gadsby’s Tavern, handsome as ever.

2:27 Old sign for Stable-Leadbeater Apothecary.

3:05 Carlyle House, whose backside looks a bit different now.

5:58 King and Washington Street, although I had to look twice.

6:24 Mayor Bendheim.

6:42 Chamber of Commerce. Anyone know this building?

8:13 Another look at King and Washington. JC Penney in the building now occupied by Ross.

8:49 George Mason Hotel at Prince and S. Washington.

10:57 Looks like Robinson Terminal South, with the newsprint rolls being unloaded.

12:23 Delegation visits the Fruit Growers Express. Very little has been written about this company. Fortunately, the City included it in a new interpretive marker (The Bloxham Family) at the new Whittier Park on Duke Street.

Expansion of the Orange & Alexandria Railroad line after the Civil War heralded a transformation to large enterprises like the Fruit Growers Express (FGX) Company, which purchased the Bloxham farm in 1926. FGX, which manufactured refrigerated rail cars to transport fresh produce throughout the eastern United States, continued in business on this site until the 1980s.

12:54 Street sign for Powhatan and Bernard Street. The Traffic Control Center was there.

13:25 King Street Sign, says oldest early street sign.

13:36 Temple Village. Had to look this one up too. This was a trailer park for veterans. It was located near the intersection of Telegraph Road and Duke Street. More precisely, it was bordered by Telegraph to the western, the railroad tracks to the north, a road now part of Eisenhower Avenue to the south, and the Metro Line running past the Hoffman Theaters to the west.

January 29, 2014

In this latest installment of our deserving candidates for a historical marker in Alexandria, we look back to a forgotten event that took place near Alexandra in 1844.

170 years ago, on February 29, a tragedy that took place on the Potomac River stunned the nation. The President narrowly escaped death, but eight other souls did not. A malfunctioning gun exploded aboard the USS Princeton, killing the Secretary of the State, the Secretary of the Navy, a State Senator, a Naval captain, an Ambassador, the President’s valet and two sailors. 20 were injured and others were psychologically affected.

Of the tragedy, a historian would write, “Prior to the Civil War and the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, the Princeton disaster unquestionably was the most severe and debilitating tragedy ever to confront a President of the United States."

And yet, how many of us have heard about this event?

As so often happens with web surfing, I forget how I came across this story. Whatever the case, we are fortunate Kerry Walters, author of more than 30 books, has written about it. “Explosion on the Potomac, The 1844 Calamity Aboard the USS Princeton” is a well-written account of the disaster and the events leading up to it. The author goes further, calling it a “black swan” for Tyler, who became President in 1841 when Harrison got ill and died.

The USS Princeton arrived in Washington in February 1844. The mission for the Tyler administration was to show off the new, state of the art war ship. It carried two 12-inch guns, largest at the time. One of them was dubbed the “Peacemaker.”

What a remarkable change for the United States. Three decades earlier, in the War of 1812, Washington’s military might did not extend far beyond harsh language. Ill-equipped Alexandria had no choice but to surrender. Now, however, the British would have to pay attention. The mighty gun could accurately shoot a two-hundred pound shell five miles. Its steam-powered engines made it the fastest in the world.

In February, Captain Robert Stockton made four excursions on the Potomac. On February 29, President Tyler and his cabinet, along with 300 or more invited guests that included senators, congressmen and dignitaries, boarded a steamer in Washington for the short trip to Alexandria, where the Princeton waited. Owners of the hottest ticket in town, they shoved off the Virginia shore around 1 pm, cruising down to Mount Vernon.

Below deck, everyone dined on a lavish meal and enjoyed the festivities until an unusual sound startled them.

Walters:

The fuse was lit, the Peacemaker roared, and chaos erupted. Two large chunks of the gun's breech had blown off, instantly killing eight bystanders and injuring twenty others, including Captain Stockton. Body parts and blood covered the deck and cries of agony filled the air. In an instant, the festive occasion had turned into a gruesome disaster.

President Tyler took a beating for his decision to appoint pro-slavery and firebrand Senator John C. Calhoun, and historians have not been kind to his presidency. Fortunately for Tyler, he had found a friend and supporter. Two years after the sad passing of his wife, First Lady Letitia Tyler, he met Julia Gardiner. They married on June 26, 1844. The author writes:

Despite the thirty years difference between them, theirs was, by all accounts, a very happy marriage.

Mount Vernon is probably a more appropriate place for a marker for this event than Alexandria. Either way, we believe that given the impact and cost to the nation, one should be erected.

January 26, 2014

In October, in our series on “Deserving Candidates for a Historical Marker,” we wrote about Harriet Jacobs and Julia Wilbur, two abolitionists who crossed paths in Alexandria during the Civil War. In 1862, freed enslaved humans called “contraband” were pouring into the Federal City, as well as Union-occupied Alexandria. The influx of refugees created a humanitarian crisis.

For the next three years, Jacobs and Wilbur worked together to help clothe, shelter and educate the refugees, as well as bring national attention to their plight.

More is known about Jacobs than Wilbur. Friends of Alexandria Archaeology board member and research historian Paula Whitacre lessened that distance yesterday morning at the Alexandria Archaeology Museum. Her lecture was titled “Through the Eyes (and Pen) of Julia Wilbur.” After braving the bitterly cold temps, a standing room only crowd packed the third floor room at the Torpedo Factory to see this latest installment of the museum’s “Java Jolt” series.

Whitacre has transcribed and annotated some of Wilbur’s diaries and studied her writings and correspondence. Researchers will be pleased to know her work will available on the web in the coming months.

Poised and confident, Whitacre discussed Wilbur’s role as a relief worker and observer of history, her views of race, and the prejudice against women who fought past traditional roles in society. Over a dozen photos enhanced the presentation, many showing diary entries.

Wilbur (1815-1895) was born in upstate in New York. She gained exposure to the issues of slavery while working with the Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society.

Contemplating her role, she decided to head south. Wilbur arrived in the nation’s capital in the summer 1862 and was told help was needed in Alexandria.

Whitacre pointed out the challenges Wilbur faced in working with the Alexandria Military Governor John Slough and Reverend Albert Gladwin, Superintendent of Contrabands in the city. Instead of appreciating the work she was doing under extremely difficult conditions, they complained to their superiors about what they perceived as interference and disrespect to their rank.

Wilbur was in Alexandria when President Lincoln was assassinated. She attended the funeral procession on Pennsylvania Avenue and wrote about it in her diary. In her daily writings, Wilbur was frank at times, a valuable commodity for historians who sometimes are frustrated by those who are reluctant to reveal their true feelings and beliefs.

After the end of the war, Wilbur moved to Washington and stayed there for the rest of her life. When the Patent Office hired her as a clerk, she became their first female employee.

Wilbur died in 1895 in Washington and was buried in her home state. She continues, however, to touch hearts and minds, as did this presentation.

January 24, 2014

Featuring original interviews with key players and weaving together the narrative of one of baseball’s greatest seasons with the racially charged events of that year, 1954 demonstrates how our national pastime—with the notable exception of the Yankees, who represented white supremacy in the game—was actually ahead of the curve in terms of the acceptance of black Americans, while the nation at large continued to struggle with tolerance.

On cold winter days like this one, baseball fans need something to warm their hearts. Giants fans and others can feel good about an upcoming book. Bill Madden, who knows a thing or two about baseball in the Big Apple, has written, “1954: The Year Willie Mays and the First Generation of Black Superstars Changed Major League Baseball Forever.”

January 22, 2014

The complete build-out of Potomac Yard, the fast rising neighborhood located between Old Town Alexandria, Del Ray and Crystal City, is still years away. In less than three years, however, after the first residents moved in, the City of Alexandria and Pulte Homes have erected over a dozen interpretive markers.

In addition to texts and images, each one provides an historic map or two. We put together a collection of some of them to help us understand a bit more about this unique space.

Time period: Native American and Colonial

One or more of the roads you travel on in the DMV may very well have been built along a path carved out by Native Americans. One of the first was the “Potomac Path.” This marker shows a map drawn by Joshua Fry and Peterson Jefferson in 1751 (“A map of the most inhabited part of Virginia containing the whole province of Maryland with part of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and North Carolina.”)

A red line overlay shows the probable location of the Potomac Path.

It should be noted this path turned east about two miles south of the future site of Potomac Yard. In the 1740s, a ferry ran across the Potomac to Georgetown, so colonial era travelers did traverse these lands.

One of the earliest well-marked maps for this part of Northern Virginia is the “1741 Howson Patent.” In 1669, John Alexander (1605-1677), an immigrant from Scotland, purchased these 6,000 acres on land now occupied by Old Town and Potomac Yard.

Some have written that Alexandria is named for Alexander. This marker updates the information, noting it may have been named after the family, which maintained this property for more than 240 years.

Another interesting item from this map, drawn about eight years before Alexandria’s founding in 1749, shows that Townsend Dade and W. Baldwin Dade also owned some of the Howson Patent land. I had never seen these two names before. Further research would be interesting.

Time Period: 1800s

Turnpikes

Tidewater Virginia was blessed with rivers flowing from the piedmont, but rolling roads were soon needed to transport hogsheads full of tobacco to makeshift ports and inspection stations such as Alexandria. These roads were not enough, as the population grew.

This marker notes one of the most important roads was Washington & Alexandria Turnpike. It got its start in 1808 and connected the two cities, as well as bringing in goods and residents to the seaport city and area. One of the granite markers notes the turnpike was the first direct road between Alexandria and Long Bridge, the forerunner of the 14th Street Bridge. It “quickened travel to the nation’s capital and served as the primary mail route.”

As seen on this map (“Atlas of fifteen miles around Washington, including the counties of Fairfax and Alexandria, Virginia, 1878”), Route 1 (Jefferson Davis Highway) runs along or close to where the turnpike ran through the Potomac Yard future site. An overlay shows this to be the western edge of Potomac Yards.

With the advent of canals and railroads, the turnpike saw less and less traffic.

Canals

About 25 years after the Washington and Alexandria Turnpike was built, plans were drawn up for the Alexandria Canal. It was built between 1831 and 1843. Being connected with the Chesapeake and Ohio canal helped Alexandria prosper. Coal was the major product shipped, as well as wheat, corn, whiskey, cornmeal and flour.

This 1838 map shows the seven miles of the Alexandria Canal between Alexandria and Georgetown. The entire system was 185 miles. The advent of railroads and steam-powered vessels signaled the end of the canal, which closed down in 1886.

Railroads

The sight of the first railroad chugging toward Alexandria must have been quite an exciting moment. It took place in 1853 with the Alexandria, Loudoun, and Hampshire Railroad, which connected Alexandria with the farms in the piedmont and points westward.

One year later, the Alexandria and Washington Railroad transported passengers between the two cities.

Time Period: 1900s

Streetcars

As we speak, a dedicated lane is being built along the western edge of Potomac Yard. Buses will use the middle roadway, and there is a possibility streetcars will be built there.

If so, it would not be the first time such public transportation served these parts. In 1892, the Washington, Alexandria & Mount Vernon (WA&MV) Electric Railroad opened. As this map shows (those are ice crystals from this morning!), it traveled through Del Ray along Commonwealth Avenue, with stops at today’s streets – Alexandria, Monroe, Bellefonte, Del Ray, Mount Ida, Ashby - and Four Mile Run Park. Service extended to Mount Vernon, one of the area's most popular tourist destinations at that time.

One of the markers points out that this route " quickly expanded into an interurban line, enabling middle-class federal employees working in Washington, D.C., to move to new “streetcar suburbs” west of Potomac Yard."

Streetcars lasted longer in the District and Maryland than in Virginia. This line closed down in 1932 due to competition from buses and automobiles.

(It should be noted this line about a half mile from Potomac Yard, thus not as much information about streetcars is given).

Potomac Yard

In her paper on the history of Potomac Yard, Fran Bromberg (Alexandria Archaeology) explains its origins.

With multiple rail companies serving each region at the turn of the twentieth century, there was no central location for the transfer of freight between the northern and southern lines (Mullen 2007:47). The situation was particularly difficult in Alexandria, where a significant bottleneck occurred with all these rail lines trying to pass through town. East/west City streets were blocked, as 20 to 30 trains per day came through on Fayette and Henry streets. With the rising volume of rail traffic, the system became increasingly unwieldy, and a movement to beautify Washington took up the cause to get the railroads out of the cities (Griffin 2005). The solution took shape as an unusual business undertaking, when six competing railroads agreed to band together to construct the rail yard and facilitate the movement of freight between the northern and southern rail lines. Potomac Yard, known as the “Gateway Between the North and the South,” became the largest railroad yard for freight car interchange on the east coast. When Potomac Yard opened on August 1, 1906, it had 52 miles of track that could handle 3,127 cars. The yard grew to a maximum of 136 miles of track crammed into a 2 1⁄2 to 3 mile stretch of land. At its peak, it serviced 103 trains daily (Griffin 2005; Carper 1992; Mullen 2007:47, 49).

As one of the granite markers points out, Potomac Yard was a “freight classification yard that revolutionized the railroad industry.” It opened in 1906 and spread out over 450 acres with 52 miles of track. Peak production required 24/7 operations. More than 1,200 workers worked one of three shifts.

The blue and white interpretive marker explains the process:

Most trains entering the Yard were composed of rail cars bound for different destinations. One train entering the Yard might contain cars bound for five or more cities. To increase efficiency, these trains were “switched” (or dismantled) and reassembled into different trains where all the cars were headed to the same location, or at least a destination along the same route.

Competition from trucks and airplanes brought about the end of operations. Potomac Yard closed down in 1992.

Conclusion

The tracks and trains of the old Potomac Yard are gone, but ever restless, the new neighborhood there continues to teem with activity. Metro, Amtrak and VRE keep the east side busy, while the west side sees streaming traffic along Route 1 and soon the buses on the dedicated lanes. In between, construction continues for homes, offices and retail.

One day in the not too distant future, someone will provide a map of the completed neighborhood. We bet it won’t be the last one for this unique space in Alexandria.

January 20, 2014

Picked up and enjoying “Planting an Empire, The Early Chesapeake in British North America” by Jean B. Russo & J. Elliot Russo. Some of it is ground covered by Virginius Dabney in “Virginia: The New Dominion, A History from 1607 to the Present,” but as they say, the key to learning is repetition. I also like their writing style.

When we first arrived here in 1995, I remember hearing about the “Eastern Shore.” I thought, wait a minute. That part of Maryland is on the western shore of the peninsula. Then I figured it out – the orientation is from the Chesapeake.

Whenever I read a book, I like to be able to see the setting in my mind’s eye. This book challenged me to learn the geography of the Chesapeake region.

As a Virginian, I’ve become more familiar with the geography of the Commonwealth than the Old Line State. Reading about the Nanticoke and the Pocomoke, two major rivers in southern Maryland, made me realize how ignorant I was of the Eastern Shore.

I like the authors’ approach, covering both Virginia and Maryland as a whole. It’s interesting that Virginia developed as a royal colony while Maryland fell under the rule of the Lord Baltimores.

But it’s the geography that pulls me in the most. The lay of the land favored Virginia with proximity to the mouth of the bay and a longer growing season. Maryland was less suited to growing tobacco. At the same time, the Eastern Shore residents “experienced neither Virginia’s extremes of wealth and the large scale investment in enslaved labor.”

Settlers in Maryland also avoided large-scale war and conflict with the Native Americans, whereas much blood was shed in Virginia.

Illustrations are helpful, including the classic 1612 map drawn by John Smith. The authors also cover the dreadful treatment of enslaved humans and the conflicts with the Native Americans.

Of that map, land lovers beware. North-south is left and right. We have to remember the perspective is from a ship coming from the old world...

January 18, 2014

During the post-World War II building boom, the Washington, D.C. area grew by leaps and bounds. Many people benefitted from the suburban growth, but there were casualties, including the loss of historic properties.

One place that fared better than most is the village of Brentsville. Located about three miles south of Manassas, it served as the seat of Prince William County from 1822 to 1893. The 25-acre historic site includes five buildings and a good number of interpretive markers. The setting is very pleasant with Broad Run meandering past and manicured green space. Another great benefit is that Brentsville it is not on a main highway.

Brentsville was born out of the Brent Town Tract of 1686, a grant given by King James II to George Brent, Richard Foote, Robert Bristow and Nicholas Hayward. Colonists were pushing westward away from the Potomac. Bristow took the northern tract where Brentsville was founded in 1822.

Prince William County, formed in 1731, originally included Alexandria, Arlington, Fairfax, Loudoun and Fauquier County. It has seen five county seats, including Woodbridge, Aden (Cedar Run), Dumfries, Brentsville and Manassas.

Dumfries served as the county seat for several decades but silting of the river doomed it as a seaport. A HABS report notes as early as 1770, Dumfries was “already inconvenient to three-fourths of the population of the county.” Brentsville, with views of the mountains, was more centrally located and won out as the new seat in 1822. Eugene M. Scheel (“Crossroads and Corners”) notes the move was a “hint that Old Prince William had shifted from a maritime to a farming economy.”

Brentsville’s Main Street is today’s Bristow Road. Seventy lots were laid out. Hooe Street is also a remant. A restored church, the old jail, and one-room schoolhouse stand out.

The Civil War had a deleterious effect on Brentsville. Its fate was sealed when the Alexandria and Orange Railroad ran through Manassas. In 1893, the County seat moved there.

The site is closed for the season but the interpretive markers tell the stories. Brentsville is a refuge of sorts, and a proud survivor of the battles others like it lost in the last century.

Sources:

Prince William: A Past to Preserve, The Prince William County Historical Commission, 1998, Edited by Laurie C. Wieder

Crossroads and Corners, A Tour of the Villages, Towns, and Post Offices of Prince William County, 1996, Eugene M. Scheel and Historic Prince William, Inc.